Alibaba Cloud
vs
Salad
What's good about each
- 30+ regions, most in mainland China and Asia-Pacific
- 3,200+ CDN nodes in 70+ countries
- Qwen models served through Model Studio
- PolarDB, its own MySQL and PostgreSQL-compatible database
Price comparison
Closest matching configuration on each side, monthly list price in USD.
| Service | Alibaba Cloud | Salad | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Small VM | $5.62 /mo 2 vCPU, 1 GiB RAM (ecs.e-c2m1.large) | -- Not listed | |
| Medium VM | $60.34 /mo 4 vCPU, 8 GiB RAM (ecs.e-c1m2.xlarge) | -- Not listed | |
| Large VM | $188.64 /mo 8 vCPU, 16 GiB RAM (ecs.c8a.2xlarge) | -- Not listed | |
| Block storage | $7.60 /mo 100 GB (ESSD PL0) | -- Not listed | |
| Object storage | $27.70 /mo 1 TB | -- Not listed | |
| Load balancer | $19.40 /mo Network Load Balancer | -- Not listed | |
| Serverless | $20.63 /mo 25M invocations, 512 MB RAM, 150 ms duration (0.15 vCPU) | -- Not listed | |
| Egress allowance | 200 GB / mo | -- Not listed | |
| Egress | $74.00 /TB $0.074 / GB | -- Not listed |
Heads up: Figures take each provider's closest plan to a common setup, and vary by region and usage. Hover a service for the reference configuration. Verify before provisioning. More on how we price.
GPUs
Alibaba Cloud offers 4 GPU models, while Salad offers 35. Cheapest listed price per GPU per hour; GPUs both providers sell come first.
| GPU | Alibaba Cloud | Salad | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
V100
14 configs
|
$1.51 /GPU/hr Reserved (12 mo) | -- | Alibaba Cloud only |
|
T4
12 configs
|
$0.62 /GPU/hr Reserved (12 mo) | -- | Alibaba Cloud only |
|
A10
26 configs
|
$0.71 /GPU/hr Reserved (12 mo) | -- | Alibaba Cloud only |
|
P100
12 configs
|
$0.87 /GPU/hr Reserved (12 mo) | -- | Alibaba Cloud only |
|
RTX 5090
2 configs
|
-- | $0.25 /GPU/hr Spot | Salad only |
|
RTX 4090
2 configs
|
-- | $0.16 /GPU/hr Spot | Salad only |
|
RTX 3090
2 configs
|
-- | $0.09 /GPU/hr Spot | Salad only |
|
RTX 5060 Ti
2 configs
|
-- | $0.07 /GPU/hr Spot | Salad only |
|
RTX 3060
4 configs
|
-- | $0.03 /GPU/hr Spot | Salad only |
|
RTX 5080
2 configs
|
-- | $0.15 /GPU/hr Spot | Salad only |
Alibaba Cloud bills on-demand and reserved (12 months); Salad bills on-demand and spot. The line under each price names the billing type shown.
Services
Managed services each provider offers.
Compliance
Frameworks each provider states on its own site, each linked to its source.
| Framework | Alibaba Cloud | Salad |
|---|---|---|
| SOC 2 | Type II | Type I, platform only |
| ISO 27001 | Yes | -- |
| HIPAA | Yes | -- |
| GDPR | Yes | -- |
| PCI DSS | Level 1 | -- |
Heads up: Each entry links to the provider's own statement. An attestation can cover one tier, one region or the platform alone rather than every service. Verify the scope before you rely on it. A dash means we found nothing to link to, not that the provider lacks it.
Company details
| Fact | Alibaba Cloud | Salad |
|---|---|---|
| Founded | 2009 | 2018 |
| Headquarters | China | USA |
| Locations | 31 | -- |
| Example customers | Taobao, Henkel, Hang Seng Bank, Tiger Brokers | Discord, Stability AI, Blend, undetectable.ai, Civitai |
| Website | www.alibabacloud.com | salad.com |
Alternatives to consider
Compare Alibaba Cloud and Salad against other cloud providers.
Our data for Alibaba Cloud was last updated on Oct. 1, 2026, and for Salad on Oct. 1, 2026.